TigerHawk

TigerHawk (ti*ger*hawk): n. 1. The title of this blog and the nom de plume of its founding blogger; 2. A deep bow to the Princeton Tigers and the Iowa Hawkeyes; 3. The nickname for Iowa's Hawkeye logo. Posts include thoughts of the day on international affairs, politics, things that strike us as hilarious and personal observations. The opinions we express are our own, and not those of each other, our employers, our relatives, our dead ancestors, or unrelated people of similar ethnicity.

Thursday, March 10, 2011

Here's to you, real arguments of genius!

By Andrew Hofer at 3/10/2011 08:43:00 PM

I was not surprised to see demonstrators pulling out Hitler quotations about unions and Godwinizing everyone who wants to put municipal finance on a sustainable footing through some other means than tax hikes. I was gobsmacked to see educated friends passing around this quote-

"We must close union offices, confiscate their money and put their leaders in prison. We must reduce workers salaries and take away their right to strike" - Adolf Hitler, May 2, 1933.

-handling it as if it dripped with current relevance, and as if eliminating mandatory dues withholding were akin to putting people in prison. I can't find the cite, but stipulating that it is real, it proves....what exactly? Let's see what other non-dispositive things Hitler apparently said:

I am convinced that we cannot possibly dispense with the trades unions. On the contrary, they are among the most important institutions in the economic life of the nation. Not only are they important in the sphere of social policy but also, and even more so, in the national political sphere. For when the great masses of a nation see their vital needs satisfied through a just trade unionist movement the stamina of the whole nation in its struggle for existence will be enormously reinforced thereby.
Before everything else, the trades unions are necessary as building stones for the future economic parliament, which will be made up of chambers representing the various professions and occupations.

We are socialists, we are enemies of today’s capitalistic economic system for the exploitation of the economically weak, with its unfair salaries, with its unseemly evaluation of a human being according to wealth and property instead of responsibility and performance, and we are determined to destroy this system under all conditions.

It is thus necessary that the individual should finally come to realize that his own ego is of no importance in comparison with the existence of the nation, that the position of the individual is conditioned solely by the interests of the nation as a whole.

This year will go down in history. For the first time, a civilized nation has full gun registration! Our streets will be safer, our police more efficient, and the world will follow our lead into the future." --Adolf Hitler, 1935

At that time I had, and I still have today, a firmly rooted conviction that when one is engaged in a great ideological struggle in the political field it would be a grave mistake to mix up economic questions with this struggle in its earlier stages. This applies particularly to our German people. For if such were to happen in their case the economic struggle would immediately distract the energy necessary for the political fight. Once the people are brought to believe that they can buy a little house with their savings they will devote themselves to the task of increasing their savings and no spare time will be left to them for the political struggle against those who, in one way or another, will one day secure possession of the pennies that have been saved. Instead of participating in the political conflict on behalf of the opinions and convictions which they have been brought to accept they will now go further with their 'settlement' idea and in the end they will find themselves for the most part sitting on the ground amidst all the stools.

To-day the National Socialist Movement is at the beginning of its struggle. In great part it must first of all shape and develop its ideals. It must employ every ounce of its energy in the struggle to have its great ideal accepted, and the success of this effort is not conceivable unless the combined energies of the movement be entirely at the service of this struggle.

To-day we have a classical example of how the active strength of a people becomes paralysed when that people is too much taken up with purely economic problems.

There's no doubt Hitler had opinions about exercise, hygiene, proper lighting and music as well.

UPDATE: a friend points out that Hitler's actions on that very day in 1933 followed that script and then some. Fair point. Actions certainly speak louder than words.

But, as I responded, if one were to try to maintain the exact opposite of all Hitler's espoused views, it would result in a hilarious game of intellectual Twister. The quotes remain dispositive of nothing.

5 Comments:

Trying to associate all who disagree with their Partisan Machine game, with "fascists".

The oldest name calling sophistry in the book, practiced by the same old Democrat Partisans who think of themselves as enlightened.

Responsible US Taxpayer says: "we are sinking into bankruptcy, as we cannot pay for these unreasonable public union pensions, benefits, etc., and they won't even try to negotiate to address the impending financial disaster ... we must do something"

Some Democrat friends of mine are ready to vote Republican. My wife, for example (a lifelong Democrat), is outraged by the events in Wisconsin and ready to vote Scott Walker a medal for his courage. Other Democrat friends, though, have deliberately closed their minds in a sort of bunker reaction. They refuse to acknowledge the horrible actions of those on the left these last few months and years, and just keep repeating the Godwinesque comments no matter what evidence they see. Union thugs beat up some poor demonstrator? They tell me the "Tea Partiers are racist" and needs to be confronted. College students shout down or attack conservative speakers? Well, obviously, rightist violent rhetoric is at fault. Some MSA someplace calls for a new holocaust? Well, if the Jews would only stop war making, this sort of understandable rhetoric would be reduced.

The nonsense of the few defies all reason. The big problem, from my perspective, is that these crazies have been remarkably successfull at electing their ilk to Congress; so successful, in fact, that Democrat leadership in Congress is all from the loony side of the party. People like my wife, middle class and "centrist" in most ways, are unhappily preparing themselves to vote Republican because they just can't stand the idiocy anymore.